Traditional drilling and excavation methods utilize drills to form holes in one or more layers of material to be penetrated. Excavation, quarrying, and tunnel boring may also use explosives placed in the holes and detonated in order to break apart at least a portion of the material. The use of explosives results in additional safety and regulatory burdens which increase operational cost. Typically these methods cycle from drill, blast, removal of material, and ground support and are relatively slow (many minutes to hours to days per linear foot is typical depending on the cross-sectional area being moved) methods for removing material to form a desired excavation.